


ten thousand lightning bugs

by fueledbysquee



Category: Panic! at the Disco
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Dancing, First Kiss, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-31
Updated: 2014-05-31
Packaged: 2018-01-27 18:30:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,454
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1719143
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fueledbysquee/pseuds/fueledbysquee
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Brendon nods to himself in the dark, because, <i>of course</i>.  It's a Valentine's dance.  The kind you bring your date chocolate and flowers and, like, a Hallmark card for.  Not the kind you go to with just your friend.  Not your guy friend."</p>
            </blockquote>





	ten thousand lightning bugs

**Author's Note:**

> a/n: written for an anon_lovefest prompt. Cliched high school movie plot is cliched.

"Hey Spence?" Brendon says, when he's half-hoping that Spencer's already fallen asleep. It's warm in Spencer's room, and Brendon's a little fidgety, but he's trying to be a good guest and not keep Spencer up all night. Even though he thinks maybe you're supposed to stay up all night at sleepovers, but then again maybe that's just girls. Spencer always falls asleep hours before Brendon's even tired on nights like this, when he's really, really happy and a little wound up, and warmed by the thought of all of Spencer's attention without distractions like school or siblings or new TV.

He hears Spencer roll over, but Brendon's body is blocking most of the light coming in from under the door, so he can't tell if Spencer's awake or just moving around as he settles into sleep like he always does.

Brendon holds his breath, just a little, sort of a like a game to see how quiet he can be, until Spencer mumbles, "Stop it. You're going to give yourself brain damage," and he lets the air out in a whoosh and part of a laugh. Spencer smacks him on the arm and chuckles, too. "Idiot," he says, but it's in the same fond tone Spencer always uses, the way his whole family talks to each other, like the "my" is there, just unspoken.

Even though the game is up, Brendon doesn't say anything, too nervous now to continue, and content to just _be_ some more since Spencer's awake.

At least, he's content until Spencer thumps him again. "Dude. What is it?"

"I was just-" Brendon breaks off, and he can feel his face getting warm, and that's the other reason he waited until the middle of the night to bring this up. "Do you think you're going to the Valentine's Dance?" He clamps his mouth shut after he finishes the question to keep in the rambling and backtracking that are sure to give away how freaked-out he is, and Spencer makes a thinking sound. Brendon's throat gets tighter and tighter as he waits and he's maybe a little lightheaded, like he's stoppered up his throat with words and there's no air getting through. It's hard to tell if he's dizzy, since he's flat on the floor.

"I don't know," Spencer says, finally. "Do you think we should? Ryan went sophomore year, and he said it was really cheesy." Brendon wastes enough time trying to get past that _we_ that Spencer keeps talking before he gets any words out. "Stephanie's been sort of hanging around my locker acting shifty. I think she wants me to ask her, but I didn't want to go unless you were too."

Brendon nods to himself in the dark, because, _of course_. It's a Valentine's dance. The kind you bring your date chocolate and flowers and, like, a Hallmark card for. Not the kind you go to with just your friend. Not your guy friend.

"Like a double date?" Brendon asks, once his heart limps far enough to catch up to his brain.

"Yeah," Spencer says. "I mean, then if it's stupid or, like, our dates disappear to the bathroom for an hour or whatever, we've still got each other."

"Right," Brendon says. "Yeah, no, totally. That's totally a good plan." It's totally as close as he's going to get to what he wants, anyway.

~~

On Monday, Spencer asks Stephanie to go to the dance. The dull ache in Brendon's stomach never quite goes away, but turns out it's not as awful he'd been expecting, for a couple reasons.

First, Spencer asks her in the 5 seconds when they pass in the hall, walking opposite directions to 3rd period. She doesn't seem to know what to do with the information, maybe since he didn't ask at lunch, or over the phone, or at her locker with a bouquet of roses or whatever, like a normal boy asking a girl to the most romantic dance of the year.

Then, when Stephanie sees Spencer before 5th, she tells him that her friend Janine needs a date too, and Spencer should ask Brendon if they can double date. So not only does Brendon not have to risk rejection for a date he doesn't even want to go on, which is awesome by itself, but he doesn't even have to put any thought into picking a someone. Janine is shorter than he is, and pretty enough, and seems to fall into the "laughing with him" camp rather than the "laughing at him" one, so it might not suck any more than it absolutely has to.

He's so relieved at how well its going that he's not even going to let the teen-movie cliche of not knowing how to dance hold him back, because it's not like there will be real dancing, not at a high school dance, and Brendon can hop around and flail like an idiot with the best of them. Even without having been to a dance before, he knows which teachers chaperone them, and any hanky-panky dirty dancing will definitely not be tolerated.

Of course, in the teen-movie cliche, Spencer would be all nervous about his date and about stepping on her feet, and Brendon would be the gracious and unexpectedly knowledgeable friend who helps him learn to dance. And possibly learn how to kiss. Brendon could totally be Watts from _Some Kind of Wonderful_ , if the situation demanded. The dancing, not so much, but he's watched enough musicals and romantic comedies that he can probably fake it if he had the opportunity.

Even though he is really, completely not qualified to help, and it happens sort of without permission of his brain, Brendon can't help but ask Spencer if he's nervous about slow-dancing with Stephanie.

Somehow, the fact that Spencer is secretly Fred Astaire had escaped Brendon's notice.

"My, uh," Spencer says. "My mom likes to dance, but my dad's really not very good, so I sort of had to learn, y'know?" He pauses, and maybe he's embarrassed about it because he looks a little flushed, and they haven't been doing anything but sitting around. "Did you. I mean, your parents probably don't. Are you worried about dancing? Because I could." He makes a sort of fluttering waving gesture. "You know. If you wanted."

Brendon's having a little trouble remembering his date's name, in general, so no, he's not all that concerned about whether he scuffs her party shoes or bumps into her, but this is a golden opportunity not to be passed up.

As much as he wants it to be awesome, and, like, subtlely romantic, he can't even lie to himself about it. It's awkward as hell, and Spencer really, truly, only knows how to lead, which could be sort of hot under other circumstances, but in this one, it just means that Spencer gets flustered and frustrated, and is ready to quit about three minutes in and call his mom or one of his sisters in to practice with Brendon while Spencer stands back and instructs. It's not like Brendon needs to learn to, like, waltz though, he just needs to be comfortable putting a hand on someone's hip or holding her hand and guiding a little, and Spencer can totally teach him that much. He finally convinces Spencer that they just need to not try anything fancy.

This is how Brendon ends up standing in Spencer's room, with his arms not precisely around Spencer, but certainly a lot closer than they ever would be otherwise. Eventually, when it looks like Brendon's got the concept of leading down, Spencer turns some music on, and then they're swaying along to - "Wait, is this _More than Words_?" Brendon asks. Spencer sort of stutters to a halt, because Brendon can't precisely talk and dance at the same time yet. "We are totally slow-dancing to the _Monster Ballads_ CD, aren't we?"

~~

"Wow, that's a lot of pink," are the first words out of Brendon's mouth when they walk into the gym. Not that there's anything wrong with pink for it's own sake, but it's a little bit like a Barbie Dreamhouse, and is not quite what Brendon was expecting out of the dance committee, which is composed entirely of aggressively cool junior and senior girls. This definitely looks more like a someone went crazy in a toy store, like Brendon would not be surprised to see unicorns and maybe a rainbow or two, except that rainbows have other colors than pink. He definitely expects some sort of pink arch though.

The girls are excited, have been excited ever since Brendon and Spencer picked them up, and they continue to be excited in the presence of all that pink, which is more than Brendon can deal with. Brendon manages to hold their attention long enough to get an opinion on which table they'd like to deposit their purses at, and then he gives up on participating and tries to manage polite.

30 minutes after they arrive, Janine's disappeared, off busy gossiping with some girl whose date didn't measure up to expectations, so Brendon doesn't even get the chance to be a disappointment of his own.

Stephanie, unfortunately, seems to be legitimately cool, and stays on the edge of the crowd and talks to Spencer, even tries to include Brendon in the conversation, but she sort of bounces up and down when the DJ puts on a song that she likes, and Brendon starts to feel bad for holding her back from having her perfect evening, so he encourages Spencer to go dance with her.

Even he's not enough of a loser to sit at the table gazing meaningfully at his unrequited love, though, so he goes and gets some punch, talks to a couple of people from Spanish class, and then makes a graceful exit to kill time someplace that isn't going to give him some pink version of snow blindness.

He finally figures there's no time like the present to clean 5 months of accumulated junk out of his locker.

He's been gone maybe 20 minutes when his phone chimes, and there's a _wru_ from Spencer waiting when he looks, after forcing himself to wait a couple minutes. He can always claim he didn't hear it over the music. He sends a _brb_ and then takes the long way around the halls to the gym so he can think of some reason why he wandered off. Maybe if he's lucky he'll find someone smoking up in the bathroom or something and he can hide his loserdom under eau de pot.

~~

Brendon's mostly just hanging out on his bed, staring at the ceiling, when the doorbell rings Saturday night and then his mom calls that he's got a visitor. She always says that, like the mystery is going to lure him out of his room, but he never bothers, because it's always Spencer, and he's been making himself at home in Brendon's space for what seems like forever. So Brendon doesn't move, and eventually his door opens and sure enough, it's Spencer, but he's still sort of dressed up, like he never changed out of his clothes from the dance, except a lot more put-together than Brendon would have expected after 24 hours in the outfit.

He props himself up on his elbows so that he can actually look at Spencer instead of the ceiling without hurting his neck, and he manages a suitably casual, "What's up, man. Going somewhere?" and then Spencer fucking blushes, and shit, he's going to ask Brendon to be his best man or something, like last night was the most perfect night of his life. Spencer and Stephanie had certainly seemed cozy enough when he drove them home, but Spencer had been oddly quiet after they dropped the girls off, and had wanted to go home himself instead of staying over at Brendon's like they'd planned.

"Just here," Spencer says, and Brendon raises an eyebrow at his clothes, but he doesn't volunteer anything else.

Spencer twitches a little, like he isn't sure where to go, and then pushes Brendon's feet out of the way and sits down on the bed. "So, Stephanie said you're really nice," he says, and Brendon curses himself for his politeness, cause now he's going to be stuck tagging along with them 'til the end of time.

Brendon makes a noncommittal sound and starts trying to think of places that he has to be on a Saturday night in case he needs to escape Spencer gushing about his new girlfriend. "Yeah, she seems nice too."

Spencer shifts a little, like he's nervous, and then half-turns towards Brendon but keeps looking at the wall. "She said, uh. She said she probably wouldn't have been as nice as you were."

Brendon's just willing to be polite, but he definitely doesn't want to sit through a second-hand recitation of whatever had been going on with Janine and her BFF-date-whatever drama from the dance. "Oh, whatever, it was fine. It's not like Janine was a real date."

But Spencer shakes his head, and his blush deepens as he starts fiddling with a the edge of the blanket. "No, uh. Stephanie said, uh, she wouldn't have been as nice if she had to double date with the person she liked. She, uh. She said she thought it was kind of obvious? That we were already dating? That's why she was so surprised that I asked her. She was, uh, trying to work up the nerve to ask me to be her partner for our History project next month."

Brendon scrambles to sit up and move away, so he can be a little more dignified when he lies through his teeth and says no, really, he totally didn't spend most of the previous night wishing that he was in Stephanie's place, but then Spencer turns to look at him finally, and Brendon gets trapped, a little, by the look in his eyes. "Brendon?" he asks, almost whispering. "Did I mess something up?" And suddenly Spencer is so, so close that Brendon can't really focus on him anymore without going crosseyed so he closes his eyes for a second, and before he opens them again he feels Spencer's lips on his, sort of tentative and a little damp, and Brendon has to open his eyes to make sure he's not imagining it. Almost as suddenly as it happened, though, it's over, and Spencer's standing up, and Brendon's about to grab him to say _wait, hold on, slow down a second so I can figure out what the hell just happened_ but Spencer hasn't moved, he's just holding out his hand to Brendon.

"I'm sorry," Spencer says. "Dance with me?"


End file.
